Better
by KelseyO
Summary: Her gaze snaps back to Spencer. "You're back! Are you… better?" That depends, Spencer thinks: better can be a final destination, like successfully bleaching a stain out of a shirt, or it can mean not-as-bad, like gluing a broken plate back together and hoping no one notices the cracks. She wonders which one Aria means. (The missing scene after Hanna & Emily left. Spoilers for 4x22)


**Remember that time they FINALLY left Spencer and Aria alone in a room together, and then gave us another Hanna/Emily scene instead? Here's what might've gone down behind that door. Pretty much completely improvised; I let Spencer and Aria take the wheel on this one.**

* * *

She can't decide if it's a blessing or a curse that she's finally in a room with her friends and they're talking about A bullshit, but whatever; theories about whether or not she split Ali's head open with a shovel are still easier to swallow than that stupid green goo.

"Yeah, I-I'll deal with that," Aria mutters when Emily interrupts to puke out something about Mike and Mona, but then her gaze snaps back to Spencer. "You're back! Are you… better?"

That depends, Spencer thinks: better can be a final destination, like successfully bleaching a stain out of a shirt, or it can mean not-as-bad, like gluing a broken plate back together and hoping no one notices the cracks. She wonders which one Aria means. "Better," she finally agrees, but it comes off her tongue like she's studying a new vocab word for AP French. "Yeah. But it's your S.O.S., so why don't you go first."

.

When Emily and Hanna excuse themselves from the room, Spencer suddenly doesn't know where to look. This is the first time she's been alone with Aria since the intervention-that-turned-into-another-intervention, since she spilled her over-medicated guts about all of her Ezra theories, since Aria's meltdown over finding out the truth, and really, what could she possibly be allowed to say at this point?

"So, are you gonna go?"

Spencer blinks at her. "Um. I mean, I already said I'm not hungry, but I guess I can go help them if you want to be alone—?"

"No, I meant…" Aria shrugs a little. "You told me to go first. Isn't it your turn now?"

Spencer lifts her shoulder just a fraction. "I told you, I'm better. What else do you want to know?"

Aria leans back against the pillows and looks her square in the eye. "The truth."

"God, you sound like Dean," Spencer mutters, suddenly clutching the edge of the desk a lot harder than she was a second ago.

"Who's Dean?"

"The drug abuse counselor who's living in our barn until I give my parents a signed statement from President Obama that I'm good as new."

Aria nods. "Oh."

There's a heavy stretch of silence in which Spencer thinks a lot about her hands, about shovels, about blood, wondering if—

"There's no way you could've done it," Aria says quietly. "You would never hurt anyone. You're not… you're not capable of something like that."

Spencer slowly wraps her arms around her chest. "Isn't that what I've been doing these past few weeks? Hurting everyone?"

"We both know that's not the same thing."

She wants to believe that, tries so hard to absorb the words into her blood stream, but now her eyes are brimming with tears and her lips are tight with the effort of holding everything back. "I just…" she croaks, then wipes away a drop of moisture as it falls. "Why won't anyone tell me what happened?"

Aria's biting her lip and shaking her head. "I don't know, Spence."

Spencer wipes her cheeks again and rakes her hair back with trembling fingers, taking a deep breath in and out. "Please stop looking at me like that," she whispers.

"Like what? Like I'm worried about you?"

The corner of her mouth twitches. "Are you afraid I might relapse again, or that I'm gonna come after you with gardening tools?"

"Spencer…"

"_What_?" she practically shouts, and she sees Aria flinch in her peripheral vision. "What could have possibly happened that was so awful that I had to black it out? What could I have _done_—"

"You need to stop," Aria interrupts, and her voice is hard now. "You're letting your parents' non-answers and my creepy, manipulative ex-boyfriend and an omnipresent stalker with _way_ too much time on their hands fill in the blanks for you, all as you're working your way through a freaking drug detox. Spence, I understand that you feel really messed up right now, but that does _not_ mean you tried to kill one of your best friends."

Spencer tries to force deep breaths around the quiet sobs in her throat, but just ends up staring down at her hands, because all she can think about is empty pill bottles and smooth shovel handles and all of the other terrible things she might've held in her palms.

Aria's in front of her now and she gently takes Spencer's wrists and lowers them, and her eyes stay locked with Spencer's for a long time. Just when she thinks she might burst into flame, Aria releases her but then wraps her arms tightly around Spencer, and Aria's body is so absurdly stable and still compared to Spencer's own.

At first she just lets Aria hug her, because it's been so long since someone touched her like this that it takes her brain longer than it should to process the action. But then her arms are up and bracketing Aria's shoulders, her hands clutching at Aria's shirt like it's her lifeline, and all of her thoughts about Ali and running and blood and dirt slowly begin to fade.

"I'm so sorry I haven't been here for you," Aria murmurs into her ear.

"Yes, how dare you not put your completely serene life on hold?" Spencer brushes her thumb against Aria's shoulder, and the arms around her tighten briefly in response.

Now there's a small sigh. "I've missed you so much."

Spencer closes her eyes and breathes in the smell of Aria's perfume. "I missed you, too."

There's footsteps on the stairs and Spencer and Aria part in unison, but then Aria's hand catches her own. "Are you okay?" she asks softly, and there's so much love and grace behind the question that Spencer knows exactly what she means this time.

She nods, and even manages to lift the corner of her mouth a little.

"Better."


End file.
